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SAN FRANCISCO (12.28.12)—Rainforest Action Network (RAN), and the community that has grown around it for more than 25 years, are mourning the sudden and tragic loss of Executive Director, Rebecca Tarbotton, who died unexpectedly on Wednesday, December 26.

When a co-owner of the venue you're playing at is one of the Bay Area's most famous musicians and he offers to join you on stage, you simply nod your head and hang on tight.

The result for attendees of the Rainforest Action Network's benefit show Wednesday night at the Sweetwater Music Hall were horn-laden, funky versions of the Grateful Dead's "Turn on Your Lovelight" and rock classics “Little Red Rooster” and “All Along The Watchtower" by Bay Area area funk band Vinyl and Dead co-founder, Mill Valley resident and Sweetwater co-owner Bob Weir.

Becky Tarbotton, an executive director of the Rainforest Action Network, called Wells Fargo "one of the worst corporate offenders" when it comes to tax payments and other issues. "The Occupy movements has opened a real space to talk about inequality and corporate power in this country. We are channeling that energy into focused pressure" at annual meetings, she said during a conference call with reporters on Monday.Full article available via below link:

Tomorrow, organizers are hitting Wells Fargo's shareholder meeting. Rebecca Tarbotton, executive director of the Rainforest Action Network, said they expect 2,000 demonstrators including 100 clergy. They plan on circling the building where the meeting is set to take place, "non-violent blockades," sit-ins inside the building, as well as placing activists inside the shareholder meeting.

Looking to build on the Occupy Wall Street movement, activists say they're turning to corporate shareholder meetings this spring to vent their anger over economic disparity in the United States and to promote an assortment of other causes.

A group called 99% Power -- a reference to those not among the top 1 percent of earners -- says it plans actions at 36 shareholder meetings, with the first big push coming at Tuesday's Wells Fargo & Co gathering in San Francisco.

The Rainforest Action Network tackles a whole lot more than rainforests, and Executive Director Rebecca Tarbotton is leading her organization to the front in a slew of fights. Her preferred tactic: "equal parts pressure and inspiration." To sway the banking industry away from mountaintop removal she arranged a campaign that telephoned every employee of JPMorgan Chase. To sway Disney, living effigies of Mickey and Minnie locked themselves to the company gates.